The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/30089.
I would characterise this as a good mid-level crossword; if I were to hunt for a criticism, it might have been improved with one less each of one-letter subtractions and envelopes, but apart from those niggles all is well. There seems to be a theme around 2D LION and 26D CATS: we haave DANIEL and DEN, ASLAN, LEO, MILLWALL (The Lions in soccer), DETROIT (Lions in American football and Tigers in baseball), CLARENCE (the cross-eyed lion which I somehow dragged up from some ancient and otherwise very forgettable TV show), NOBLE (for the King of Beasts) and perhaps MAUL and CAGE
| ACROSS | ||
| 8 | YOGI BEAR |
Flexible practitioner to support animated character (4,4)
|
| A charade of YOGI (‘flexible practitioner’) plus BEAR (‘support’). | ||
| 9 | ASSET |
Strength from dog shaking off lead (5)
|
| [b]ASSET (hound, ‘dog’) minus its first letter (‘shking off lead’). | ||
| 10 | ANON |
Year in Spanish Main’s ending soon (4)
|
| A charade of AÑO (‘year in Spanish’ – do not forget the tilde) plus N (‘MaiN‘s ending’). | ||
| 11 | EL SALVADOR |
Disney princess left queen over trouble in country (2,8)
|
| An envelope (‘over’) of ADO (‘trouble’) in ELSA (‘Disney princess’ in Frozen) plus L (‘left’) plus R (regina, ‘queen’). | ||
| 12 | DANIEL |
Book that is set in strange land (6)
|
| An envelope (‘set in’) of I.E. (‘that is’) in DANL, an anagram (‘strange’) of ‘land’. | ||
| 14 | MILLWALL |
Football team crush defensive formation (8)
|
| A charade of MILL (‘crush’) plus WALL (‘defensive formation’). | ||
| 16 | INKPADS |
North Korea’s leader hacking into computer’s digital printing devices (7)
|
| An envelope (‘hacking into’) of N (‘North’) plus K (‘Korea’s leader’) in IPAD’S (‘computer’s’). | ||
| 18 | NOBLEST |
Most generous and good of Poirot to make a comeback in case (7)
|
| A charade of NOB, a reversal (‘to make a comeback’) of BON (‘good of Poirot’ – Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot is Belgian, exidently from the French speaking part) plus LEST (‘in case’). | ||
| 21 | CLARENCE |
Carriage clock’s face cutting clumsy cleaner (8)
|
| An envelope (‘cutting’) of C (‘Clock’s face’) in CLARENE, an anagram (‘clumsy’) of ‘cleaner’. | ||
| 23 | ALEXIA |
Personal assistant admits one form of word blindness (6)
|
| An envelope (‘admits’) of I (‘one’) in ALEXA (‘personal assistant’, Amazon’s virtual assistant). | ||
| 24 | RED ADMIRAL |
Distressed maid in pantry retreating from flying insect (3,7)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of ADMI, an anagram (‘distressed’) of ‘maid’ in REDRAL, a reversal (‘retreating’ – maybe ‘from’ should be added here; it’s not much of a link word) of LARDER (‘pantry’). | ||
| 26 | CAGE |
Heartless bum in prison (4)
|
| CA[d]GE (‘bum’) minus its middle letter (‘heartless’). | ||
| 27 | INCAN |
Hotel California charges old person (5)
|
| An envelope (‘charges’) of CA (‘California’) in INN (‘hotel’). | ||
| 28 | IN NO TIME |
I mention getting hammered before you can say Jack Robinson (2,2,4)
|
| An anagram (‘getting hammered’) of ‘I mention’. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | MOUNTAIN |
Benny Hill? (8)
|
| Cryptic definition; a play on the Scots BEN (as in Nevis). | ||
| 2 | LION |
Hero knocked over nuclear fuel (4)
|
| A reversal (‘knocked over’) of N (‘nuclear’) plus OIL (‘fuel’). | ||
| 3 | RESEAL |
11 stopping Spanish team getting close again (6)
|
| An envelope (‘stopping’) of ES (’11’ EL SALVADOR – IVR) in REAL (Madrid, ‘Spanish team’). | ||
| 4 | PRESUME |
Suppose Big Bird’s turning up to support Trump? (7)
|
| ASSUME does not fit. A charade of PRES (president, ‘Trump’) plus UME, a reversal (‘turning up’ in a down light) of EMU (‘big bird’). | ||
| 5 | MAUL |
Mother starts to upset Lily Savage (4)
|
| A charade of MA (‘mother’) plus UL (‘starts to Upset Lily’). | ||
| 6 | OSCAR WILDE |
Award sounded crazy for playwright (5,5)
|
| A charade of OSCR (‘award’) plus WILDE, ‘sounded’ like WILD (‘crazy’). | ||
| 7 | STROLL |
Bad-tempered types last to get up for walk (6)
|
| TROLLS (‘bad -tempered types’) with the last letter moved to the top (in a down light; ‘last to get up’). | ||
| 13 | IMPORTANCE |
Value of New Romantic EP (10)
|
| An anagram (‘new’) of ‘Romantic EP’. | ||
| 15 | LEO |
Shot regularly dismissed Ollie Pope (3)
|
| An anagram (‘shot’) of OLE (‘regularly dismissed OlLiE‘). | ||
| 17 | DEN |
Study of depression cut short (3)
|
| DEN[t] (‘depression’) minus its last letter (‘cut short’). | ||
| 19 | SKIN GAME |
Swindling trick from man in uniform (4,4)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of KING (‘man’ in chess) in SAME (‘uniform’). | ||
| 20 | DETROIT |
Denis Villeneuve’s right to film movie in US city (7)
|
| An envelope ((‘in’, awkwardly placed) of ET (‘film movie’ – call the Department of Redundancy Department) in DROIT (‘Denis Villeneuve’s right – Brockwell double bluffs: here the name is not used cryptically, but just to indicate that Denis Villeneuve is a French-speaking Canadian film maker). | ||
| 22 | LIEBIG |
Chemist replacing parts of large Whopper (6)
|
| BIG LIE (‘large whopper’) with the two words swapped (‘replacing parts of’). | ||
| 23 | ASLANT |
2 followed by Tesla obliquely (6)
|
| A charade of ASLAN (‘2’ LION – in C S Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia) plus T (Tesla’, unit of magnetic flux density). | ||
| 25 | MANE |
Artist trimmed long hair (4)
|
| MANE[t] (‘artist’) minus the last letter (‘trimmed’). | ||
| 26 | CATS |
Musical Youth finally escaping from Jaws (4)
|
| C[h]ATS (‘jaws’) minus the H (‘youtH finally escaping’). |
Other notable LIONs besides ASLAN and CLARENCE (from Daktari – late 1960s):
ELSA was the lioness in Born Free.
SCAR was Simba’s wicked uncle in The LION (s)KING(ame).
Lions are one of the (Lie)BIG CATS.
There are also (re)SEA(l) LIONs.
Oh, and MOUNTAIN LIONs.
I’ll stop now and go back to bed.
I’m told by their supporter that Exeter City’s mascot (re 23ac) is LEXI the Lion.
I very much enjoyed this clever puzzle from Brockwell, though I wasn’t quite as perceptive as PeterO, Balfour and Trovatore when it came to spotting (!) all the LIONS. A credit to the setter that he could include so many references. My favourites were 8a YOGI BEAR, 24a RED ADMIRAL, 27a INCAN and 23d ASLANT. Thank you to Brockwell and PeterO.
Finished but missed the theme, so thanks for that PeterO. I might suggest an alternate parse of DETROIT that avoids the awkwardly-placed “in”: the Francophone’s “right”, DROIT, “to film” — to form a film around — ET (“movie”). This leaves “in” as a mere connector, not part of the WP. Ta Brockwell.
Your resident Spaniard here with a reminder that ano emphatically isn’t the Spanish word for year 🙂
Thanks Brockwell and PeterO!
A lion-hearted solve from me even if I did totally miss the theme. It does seem pretty obvious in hindsight. Couldn’t parse IN NO TIME (turns out it wasn’t a homophone) and DETROIT.
Liked MOUNTAINS, LION (took a while to see why it was right) and SKIN GAME.
Thanks PeterO and Brockwell